“Privilege” is a word much bandied-about in the online feminist and pro-feminist community. What it means varies depending on the context in which it’s used: white privilege, male privilege, class privilege, hetero privilege. Sometimes these various forms of privilege intersect, and sometimes people are privileged in some ways but oppressed in others.

What does it mean, in the most basic sense, to be a recipient of social privilege, in any or all of these areas? What, exactly, are these privileges that the privileged party receives?

First and foremost, I think, is the privilege to self-define and to define others. Oppressed people do not have the power to insist that they be labeled and perceived as they are by society at large; instead they are stereotyped. Individuality is a privilege that powerful groups can claim. Privilege is invisible to those who have it; therefore being privileged, that group is seen as the default: white, male, heterosexual, gender-normative, middle class. Anyone who varies from this mold is “Other”. They are marked as Different. Different people are defined by what they are not: the so-called “normal”, the “average”. Being defined by what they are not, rather than what they are, the Other is defined in narrow and confining terms.

This can be seen in representation in the media. A white man in a movie is just a man. He could be anybody. He is the Everyman. A black man in a movie can’t just be anybody, no, he’s the Black Man; he cannot be made the universal protagonist because he is something Different, with Different concerns and Different history and Different thoughts than what is the “average” white experience. (Nevermind that any actual differences in life experience between a white man and a black man are mostly due to the fact that a white man benefits from privilege — this is why it is invisible. It’s not that the black man is inherently different as a human being, it’s that the average white man is utterly oblivious as to how or why his life is easier; it’s not the black man’s fault if the white man can’t relate to him.)

A woman can’t be just anybody. She is defined in relation to her heterosexual interactions with men, real or hypothetical. Women are defined as the mothers of men’s children, or an objects with the purpose of men’s aesthetic, romantic, or sexual appreciation. She is somebody’s mother or somebody’s love interest, and if she is neither she is considered remarkable only in that she rejects these stereotypes. A man can be a father or a love interest, and he can be neither, but he is still a man. A female character who does not fit the traditional roles is usually referred to by her similarity to men — because if she does not fit the role of the Other, the things which men are not (or not supposed to be), then she must be aspiring to the Default. She must be trying to be like a man.

One queer character in a story makes the story “gay”. It is assumed that all characters are straight, and any representation at all is cause for outrage and alarm among some conservatives. Even acknowledging the existence of people who are not heterosexual threatens their viewpoint that homosexuality is an immoral aberration. Anyone who defies the heteronormative conception of gender has their gender taken from them: gay men are characterized as inherently effeminate and lesbians as inherently masculine, or even as non-women, non-men, asexual creatures without identity.

It must be said that, by defining the oppressed as what the privileged are not, the privileged are certainly hurt, too. These narrow categories of “normal” and “deviant” limit the self-expression of everyone — but, though it certainly hurts, this is another privilege in and of itself: the privileged person has a chance to fall from grace. Certainly, yes, being subject to cruelty for failing to live up to what one “should” be is terrible, but what is at the root of this?

At the root of it is the fact that the privileged party is now being treated like the Other, and ze is not reacting well to that indignity. A man enraged at being treated like a woman is still drawing from a misogynistic attitude — otherwise, what should be the problem? If women were not perceived to be weaker or less then men, why should it be so upsetting to bear the same burden they do? Being perceived to not be what one “should” is essentially a problem of Othered groups being stereotyped as exactly what the privileged are not.

This is why racism is everybody’s problem, why sexism is men’s problem too, why homophobia should also be a heterosexual concern. This leads to my next point:

Ignorance is a privilege. Being able to ignore the oppression of others is a privilege. It is a privilege to be unaware of or unconcerned with one’s own privileged status. It is a privilege not to experience the same things as other groups, and so, be able to discount others’ specific concerns. Simply because one does not personally experience or see the same things others do does not mean that those things do not exist.

It is a privilege to be able to believe that others’ subjective accounts of their own experience are not valid: women aren’t subject to sexism, instead, they’re “overreacting” or being “emotional”; queers are “flaunting their sexuality”; people of color are “playing the race card”; the poor are “lazy” and simply need to “work harder”; fat people “have no self-control”; everyone is “asking for it” by daring to defend their rights and dignity, or simply by virtue of being who they are.

This is why a white gay man can be racist, people of color can be homophobic, the feminist movement has historically been both of these things, and none of these groups tend to recognize the concerns of those who are not able-bodied. (And there I go, defining a group by what is it not. “Disabled” and “handicapped” seem like a ruder way of saying the same thing; does anybody who knows more about this than me know a better word?) A person privileged in some areas and disadvantaged in others is still capable of ignoring the existence or effects of hir own privilege, even when ze ought to know better. If oppression does not effect someone personally, most people tend to ignore it, believe it doesn’t exist, or think that the oppressed are lying about the extent of their oppression.

Marginalized people do not have the luxury of believing that their own experiences are not real, are imagined, are a simple misunderstanding or a fluke. It is a privilege to be free of these experiences and so able to dismiss them as legitimate or valid or logical.

Because ignorance of others’ oppression is a benefit of privilege, privilege is ignorant and in denial of its own existence.

This is, at the root, at the most basic level, what is means to have privilege: it is a sense of entitlement, a sense of superiority, and it is the sense that one’s own life experience is the most accurate measure of the state of the world. It is the idea that one’s own problems are the only and most pressing problems. It is the idea that one’s life and attitudes are the norm and all variations are simple errors that ought to be corrected. It is the idea that other people must be what you think they ought to be, tailored to your preferences and needs to be complimentary to you, what you need, what you want, what you are not, and that those who do not fulfill this purpose are doing you real harm by being themselves rather than your fantasy of them. It is massively egocentric and dismissive of others as only privilege allows.

In reality it becomes more complicated. The way that this is expressed in the real world is reinforced by racist, classist, sexist institutions which give very real benefits to the privileged at the expense of the oppressed. Because the white heterosexual middle-class man is “normal”, therefore “good”, everyone else has to work extra hard in order to be the same, or to conform to his expectations — however, becoming what one is not is impossible, and so women, people of color, etc., etc., will never be quite “good” enough. At most they are pretenders. They are still Other. At best they are seen as imitating the Default, at worst they are seen as dangerous and revolutionary and out of their place.

That is what I mean when I use this word.

Let me first begin by saying that I do not consider myself to be “politically correct“. The term is laughable; it’s a pejorative term coined by conservatives to argue against the concept itself, and so I think it’s unfortunate that there are liberals who accept the usage of the phrase without considering where it comes from or why it originated. In using the term at all, we are allowing our opponents to frame the debate and to define it. This is not in any way an effective political strategy (and, on a small US political tangent, exactly the reason why I dislike the Democratic party so intensely).
It has the connotation that people are somehow being “forced” (either by law or social disapproval) to curb their freedom of speech in order to avoid offending others, which is ridiculous and a lie. The oppressed people and the small minority of privileged allies aware of their status who insist on use of respectful language within their own circle do not have the power to “force” anyone to agree with them. We do not have the numbers to “force” anything legally in a democratic society, and forgive me for being skeptical about the claim that society at large has any concern for the feelings of the oppressed.

Beyond the connotations and history of the term which disincline me to make use of it, I do not see why it should be a bad thing to consciously attempt to use language with which marginalized people are more comfortable. There is no defensible or noble reason for purposely using offensive language in an effort to offend. The reason usually given is one of convenience — it is more trouble to be at least a little polite and respectful to others than it is to be a complete asshole. It is too much effort for those in a position of social and hierarchical privilege to acknowledge the feelings of others. At best, this excuse is simply rude, and at worst, inexcusably cruel.

This is the only real reason I can see for opposing the concept of using the language others prefer to describe themselves. It is because people want to avoid looking at their own privilege. It is because people are cruel, and sexist, and racist, and otherwise hold every other type of prejudice imaginable. (Too many to list.) I think that the majority of people are ignorant and also unfortunately fond of loudly expressing themselves, so that they see any attempt to gently inform them of the effects their words have as an attempt to force them to abdicate their freedoms. And I think that there exist those, thankfully fewer in number, with more malevolent reasons, people who sincerely understand what they are doing and continue to want to hurt others despite it.

When you say “I’m sick of being PC”, what you’re saying is “I’m sick of treating others as equals”. When you say “It’s so much trouble to make sure I’m not offending someone” what you’re saying is “It’s too much trouble to be kind”. (And when you say “I hate that everyone’s trying so hard to be ‘fair’ to every group out there”, you’re not only being totally horrible, but obviously living in a delusional alternate universe, but that’s neither here nor there.)

No no expects anyone to always know the answers. I admit that I may not be aware of certain aspects of my use of language, so if I unintentionally use discriminatory or offensive language, I expect to be called on it. This is how we learn. It’s a process of trial and error, and I understand better than anyone that it is embarrassing to realize that you are wrong, or to be called on a self-righteous manifestation of privilege, and that this is often expressed in the form of an indignant “Well you didn’t have to jump all over me!”

At the same time, it’s nobody’s responsibility to educate me. I will work hard to try and understand these issues, because I am interested in being a more-or-less compassionate and fair human being. The rights and dignity of others are far more important than my own self-conscious desire to appear all-knowing and infallible.

This is in no way an effort to force others to agree with me or conform with my worldview; in all honesty, some of the people I insist on showing respect to would not return the favor. I am not attempting to tell others what they can and cannot say; it would be nice if other people agreed with my priorities and sympathized with my opinions. I believe in absolute freedom of speech, but also that decent people should have a few limits on what they will allow themselves to say. And freedom of speech is not freedom from critical analysis, freedom from criticism, freedom from opposition.

Freedom of speech is also a responsibility. Since I have the power to say whatever I like, I also have the responsibility to say things that I think are well-reasoned and respectful. This does not mean that I will not argue, will not disagree, will not pass judgment. This does not mean that I will not express ideas which many people probably find offensive, radical, or objectionable. It simply means I will try to express these ideas while avoiding any unnecessary use of terms purposely designed to marginalize or misrepresent already oppressed people.

Anyone who is remotely interested in justice and human rights needs to adopt the same attitude. And those who claim not to care at least need to understand the horrific gravity of what they are saying.

I’ve already talked a little about the word queer and how I identify with it. I love being queer. It can mean anything, so long as it’s out of the ordinary, not what’s expected, not what’s supposedly “normal”. It’s open enough that it doesn’t have to put me in a box according to whom I might or might not find attractive (straight? hell no! lesbian? not entirely. bisexual? binary systems = evil. pansexual? no one knows what the hell it means) — instead I can just be me.

But the other word I love is “dyke”.

Dyke is not about what box other people can put you in. It’s not a convenient label to allow other people to tell you who you are or should be. Dyke is an attitude. Dykeness is a state of mind, a way of life, a woman who likes women and won’t take shit about it from anyone.

A dyke is a woman who knows she doesn’t need a man to be complete. A dyke is a woman who, confronted with the idea that she needs to dress, talk, act a certain way in order to land Mr. Perfect, Prince Charming, just laughs out loud and walks away. A dyke knows she doesn’t have to do anything to impress anyone, but certainly not guys. She dresses how she wants because she wants to, not because it’s supposed to make men want her. She’ll wear what makes her comfortable, whether that’s high heels and a skirt or lumberjack plaid and tennis shoes. She’ll act without restraint, sometimes in situations where such behavior might not be appropriate, because she doesn’t care if people think she’s ladylike, demure enough, good enough to find a man to marry her. She is who she is because that’s who she is, not because a man made her that way.

This isn’t to say straight women let men dictate their lives, but when they don’t necessarily need to be in the picture, it’s so much easier to laugh off their attempts at control. Why worry what any man thinks? You don’t need him. Who wants most straight men, anyway? There’s so much more to life than pleasing them. A dyke doesn’t need to make men like her, because a dyke is a woman who loves women.

That’s the other thing — a dyke loves women. Really loves. The way some straight men say they do, but they don’t mean it, they don’t understand what it’s really like to love a woman because they aren’t one. It’s not the same at all. There a very few men who can truly adore a woman the way another woman can, really understanding, really appreciating her, really taking her in, because a woman knows. A woman knows what other women’s lives are like, what we are when you tear the patriarchy down, when you take away the social conditioning and the expectations and all the other bullshit. Only a woman is capable of really beginning to know what another woman is really like, beneath it all. Oh, men can try, and it’s admirable of them really, but I don’t know if it’s really possible for them to truly empathize, no matter how supportive they are.

And that’s what “dyke” means to me. That’s why I like to call myself a dyke, even if I’m not technically just a lesbian, because I’m a woman who loves women and knows I don’t need a man and, hell, doesn’t much care about landing one. I’m queer. I’m a dyke. Everyone else can just get the hell used to it.

I don’t have a car. I hate driving and it’s probably safer for everyone on the road; I’m incapable of both getting the car to move in a straight line and also paying attention to a million different things going on at once around me. As a consequence, if any place I want to go is within a few miles, I’ll walk. I get rides from people or take the bus.

For some reason the past few years I’ve been victim to an explosion of random harassment on the street. No one ever used to bother me until about three years ago, when all of the sudden I was suddenly subject to unwanted attention by guys trying to intimidate me into going out with them, or men shouting at me or honking on the street. I’m not a person who deals well with this. I freeze up. I want to crawl into a hole in the sidewalk somewhere and just die. It’s the most I can do to simply ignore it and not give them the satisfaction of a response; forget confronting anyone, yelling “fuck you” or flipping them off — I wish to God I could. My reflexes aren’t that fast and it upsets me too much to immediately react. And maybe I’m a little afraid to. I think my attitude is enough to keep people from confronting me, generally (apparently I scare and intimidate people), but apart from that, I’m a very small person. I feel tiny, and I’m very aware, sometimes, how vulnerable that makes me.

Anyway, I hadn’t had any problems since August or September, so I suppose I assumed that it had somehow stopped. But I think the assholes were just waiting until spring to emerge.

In the past few weeks, I’ve been honked at many times and even had one idiot stop in the middle of the street (residential neighborhood, so not a lot of traffic) and slooowly cruise by, making sounds which I honestly thought at first were a pigeon or something. (I swear this is true. Sexy, huh? He sure thought so. Dumbass.) He finally drove away when I refused to acknowledge him at all and people behind him got pissed off and started honking. But none of this has ever really bothered me. Sure, I didn’t like it, but I can forget it and keep going about my day.

Today, while walking to work, I had some guys zoom by and scream at me. Some unintelligible but almost certainly obscene statement that ended with the word “bitch”. (At first it really bothered me that I couldn’t make out what they’d said. But I’m pretty sure I’m better off not knowing.) I have no idea what I did to deserve being called names. Maybe they’d tried to get my attention and I didn’t notice. Or maybe they were just pathetic scum with nothing better to do with their day than assault random people. Scratch that — women. People don’t do this to men. And that is an act of violence. It is a violation. To not feel safe in your own neighborhood, half a block away from, of all things, an elementary school, with kindergartners running around and everything.

That did upset me. I got to work and wanted to cry. It took me most of the day to even begin to forget about it. Being called a bitch on the street ruined my day.
Tell me that’s a compliment. Just try to tell me I should appreciate that they found me an attractive target for their aggression. I fucking dare you.

It’s not any different at all from when men cat-call or whistle or say other things which may not involve such rude language or names. It’s the same sentiment, it’s just that these guys didn’t feel the need to hide their utter contempt for women. It’s not a compliment. It’s not about being found attractive. It’s about men asserting their power over women — and except on the most superficial level, it’s not even sexual. It’s violent. It’s unbridled hate for simply being born what I am. An object to be despised except when I can be used.

This reminded me of an old post by Echidne on misogynists and how feminism brings them out of the woodwork. Basically this post argues that misogynists are less common than we think, it’s simply that outspoken feminist bloggers attract more trolls and give us an inflated sense of how many men really, truly hate us.

And while I think it’s a good post, and it has a point, I think it’s absolutely not true. I think misogynists are pretty fucking common. I think more men totally despise women more than we ever want to admit. Because I’m not doing anything to attract unwarranted attention when I walk on the street. I’m not spouting my politics, I’m not dressing or acting in any way which could reveal that I am a feminist or the uppity broad I am. If anything, I look average, I look feminine, and I’m the farthest thing in most people’s mind from a queer feminist stereotype. And yet I encounter this shit just as much, sometimes more, in daily life, in apolitical contexts, than I do online.

Misogyny is totally ubiquitous. It’s all-pervading. It’s everywhere, all the time, and I, at least, am being constantly bombarded with it. What makes this worse is that this behavior is perceived as normal. I don’t know what other conclusion I’m supposed to come to except that the majority of men hate women, otherwise, this wouldn’t happen constantly, and it certainly wouldn’t be seen as okay.

Yeah, I know, it could be worse. This place is better than some.

But it’s still bad.

Or, you know, you can. If you’re a masochist. As I apparently am.

First, via Daily Dose of Queer, a young man who is surprisingly insecure about other people’s gender identity. Apparently, allowing people to check “male”, “female” or write in an “other” as their gender on a college application is the end of the world. Or, at the very least, marks the other as “psychotic”. But what I really love about this editorial is that parts of it are right on the mark. The author knows what he’s talking about. It’s pretty entertaining when it’s not so stupid it’s infuriating.

For example:

There are, to be sure, rare individuals who are born intersexed (possessing attributes of both sexes), but in the Western world corrective surgery assigns a distinct sex soon after birth. [Note: Yeah, and I consider that “corrective surgery” to be mutilation, but that’s neither here nor there.] …

The push for recognizing “gender variance” has little to do with genuine biological aberrance. Its goal is not to treat those burdened with physical forms that are imperfectly realized more charitably, but to abolish sex by destroying the normative standard.

Well, speaking for myself? Yes. And? I’ve run across so many articles which talk about the feminist agenda of demolishing gender roles, establishing gender and sex as a continuum, etc, etc, and, without fail, these articles simply cite that as if it’s some self-evident flaw in feminist reasoning. They have never explained to me exactly why this is a bad thing. I assume this is because there’s no argument against the idea other than stubborn adherence to principle.

But I can explain why seeing gender, and even physical sex, as a false duality, as a continuum, is a good thing. With gender, recognizing however people define themselves is only polite and respectful. With physical sex, the differences are not as clearly-cut as most people would like to believe. Why construct these broad categories which often don’t apply? Obviously, there is benefit to constructing categories which fit most people, but the problem is that usually this ends up forcing everyone else into one or the other, which is marginalizing and often physically or psychologically damaging. This is a problem in the case of, say, the discrimination that transgendered and non-gender-normative folks face. This is a problem when intersex children are mutilated before they’re old enough to understand their own gender identity and express it, in operations which often compromise future reproductive or sexual function, which often lead to trauma when a child who identifies as one gender is raised as the other and/or that child learns what was done to them. (Though “trauma” seems an inadequate word if one means crippling depression and eventual suicide.)

But wait! It gets better:

If I approached the director of the student government’s Queer Affairs Task Force and I claimed to be an eggplant trapped in a man’s body, she would smile, nod politely (she is a nice person), and then call for friendly people in white coats to haul me off to a padded cell. But if I claimed to be a woman trapped in a man’s body, she would force others to act as if my view were correct. In short, psychosis is considered quite alright, provided it obliterates sexual norms, traditions, and taboos.

Do I even have to say anything about this quote? Really? Yeah, I think it speaks for itself. This isn’t even good or logical writing.

And, of course, the obligatory strawfeminist:

Believing in the modern liberal view of sex must require at least an hour of practice each day. How else can they believe, for example, that masculinity and femininity are social constructs with no relation to the biological differences between the sexes, while also holding that homosexuality is inherent? Or that gender is unimportant, except when someone insists that he or she is stuck in a body of the wrong gender?

The problem here, I think, is that someone a) doesn’t understand the terminology being used and b) doesn’t care. Masculinity and femininity are gender roles. Anyone can act in a way society deems “masculine” or “feminine” regardless of being male or female, man or woman, intersex or genderqueer. Gender is an internal identity, a state of mind. Sex is an inherent physical characteristic which can be medically altered to a certain extent. These are not interchangeable. That is how I can believe all these things at once; because they are not synonymous. And believing that gender should be unimportant so far as social or legal issues go, that everyone should be treated equally, is not opposed to the idea that people’s right to self-define is important.

The rest of the editorial kind of veers off into a bunch of pseudo-philosophical crap that I admit I got bored and stopped really reading closely. (I skimmed!) But apparently “Our culture has become so oversexed that it is abolishing sex.” I have no idea what this is supposed to mean, since it’s confusing the two totally different definitions of the word sex: namely, that which is related to reproduction and all its happy perks, and…innate physical characteristics that don’t necessarily have anything to do with definition number one. As I said before: logic? Decent writing skills? Anywhere to be found?

And then there’s this awful thing someone linked to in the feminist LJ community. I can’t even begin to articulate how much this article pisses me off. Whatever one thinks about Ariel Levy (Personally? I think she has some good points to make, but I don’t think she’s a very good writer from articles I’ve read. I haven’t read the book, just excerpts and articles she’s written about the book which make me disinclined to read it. I expect I’ll get around to it sometime.), I hope we can all agree that whoever wrote this thing is living in a different universe. Observe:

We’re not trying to be empowered. The twentysomething women I know don’t care about old-style feminism. Partly this is because they already see themselves as equal to men: they can work, they can vote, they can bonk on the first date.

Putting aside the myth that women have never been allowed to work outside the home (as women of color and poor women and just about any woman who wasn’t rich and well-off have always been forced to work rather than having the luxury of staying home with the kids); men and women are hardly on an equal playing field. Things are better in many ways, but it’s not equal. This remains true of all civil rights struggles. And sure, women can bonk on the first date, it just means everyone will call her a “slut”. Being called degrading names! Empowering!

Oh, but it GETS BETTER. By which I mean, much, much worse:

Another reason for the rise of raunch is that women are rediscovering the joy of being loved for their bodies, not just their minds. … Instead of desperately longing for the right to be seen as human beings, today’s girls are playing with the old-fashioned notion of being seen as sex objects.

I defy anyone to seriously argue that women are now valued for their minds at the expense of their physical characteristics. Or that women’s minds are valued. Or that women are valued. I don’t know about you, but this twentysomething girl is still at that desperately-longing-to-be-seen-as-a-human-being stage.

And you can read the rest if you really want, because there are so many gems in there I didn’t want to bother quoting. I’ll just close with this explanation on why sexual harassment in the workplace is the greatest thing ever:

If a thong makes you feel fabulous, wear it. For one thing, men in the office waste whole afternoons staring at your bottom, placing bets on whether you’re wearing underwear. Let them. Use that time to take over the company.

I would, personally, prefer if no one except possibly a sexual partner spent any time thinking about my undergarments. If they can’t help themselves, there’s no need to speak about this thought aloud. I can’t be the only one who finds this quote extremely nasty.

People who ask this question obviously don’t understand what is meant by the term “sexual objectification”. No, I don’t want to be objectified, not ever. Not by random people on the street, not by an intimate partner.

“Why?”

By definition, what is an object? An object is something inert to be manipulated by others. An object exists only for the purposes it was made and can only passively fulfil that purpose through its use by an active party. A grammatical object is the part of a sentence which indicates what is being manipulated by the subject; linguistically, an object has things done to it but does nothing on its own.

In more concrete terms, what are objects? Objects are items that exist outside of ourselves which we put to specific uses. A banana is an object. It’s a plant which has been domesticated so that its only purpose is to be consumed by human beings. The plant can no longer reproduce without human intervention, so its natural biological purpose has been subverted and it no longer has a real function outside of the uses humans design for it. When we plant grass in our yards to look nice, this is an object. The only real purpose of grass is to grow and spread, but we add cultural baggage, assumptions about class and aesthetics which we attach not only to our lawns but to their color and health, their maintanance, their growth. A car is an object; it is for transportation. A stove is an object; it is for cooking. Food is an object; it is to be cooked, it is to be eaten. A baseball is an object; it is to be thrown within the specific context of certain games.

Objects are things.

A woman is not an object.

Let me ammend that: people are not objects.

Women do not exist solely to be sexually manipulated, used, abused. When a woman is objectified she is made into a passive thing — she is not an individual with thoughts and ideas, with ambitions and goals and principles. She is simply something to be used for the pleasure of the one who objectifies her. And do things have feelings? Does anyone care what an object thinks or wants? In a very real way, objectification is dehumanization. Dehumanizing a subject, making them into an object, allows for their feelings and thoughts to be completely disregarded. Does consent matter when dealing with a thing rather than a person? Does anything matter but the pleasure and whims of the user, the abuser?

Other people are made into objects, too. It’s not just women who are made into objects in order to fulfil the fantasties of others; parents make their children into objects, too, assuming that the child’s only purpose is to live up to their expectations, to do as the parents would like the child to do. Politicians and advertizers make people into objects: we are a passive audience for them to manipulate, to do what they want us to do for their benefit and not for our own — we are a means to an end and we are not human when we do this. We are objects to be used and manipulated and then discarded when our usefulness is through.

So not all objectification is sexual. None of it is good, beneficial, or in any way desirable. I am a person, not an object. I take particular exception, however, to being made into a sexual object. My sexuality — the firing of neurons in my brain, the combination of feelings and sensations moving along my nerves, my body, my breasts, my vulva — does not exist for the pleasure of anyone but me. This is not to say that I’m selfish, that I would take pleasure from another while denying them pleasure from my body, my sex — it is to say that if I find it pleasurable to give pleasure to a particular person, that is my business. It is nothing that can be taken without my express will, my explicit consent. My body does not exist specifically for the visual or physical stimulation of others, especially those to whom I do not give permission to use me in this way.

“Don’t we all like to be objectified sometimes?”

No. I don’t. I don’t enjoy being made into a passive object to be manipulated. I don’t enjoy being made into something less-than-human. I don’t enjoy being ignored and overlooked as the individual that I am and instead made into something else against my own will.

Do I enjoy being found attractive? Yes, of course. Everyone does. But too often these two phenomona are conflated and confused. Being objectified, being verbally or sexually abused, is often said to merely be the same thing as attraction. It’s a compliment, it’s an honor to be harrassed on the street. Being a desireable object is confused with being a desireable human being. Being made into a thing to be used, which exists solely for the purpose of this use and is judged only on its usefulness, is not the same as being found attractive at all.

When a person finds another person attractive, that other person is still human. They are an active participant in all interactions. No one can have a relationship with an object; relationships are a dynamic, mutual process on the part of all involved. Relationships are an active process. In the dynamic of objectification, only one party retains active personal agency.

There is something to be said for the desire to submit, the desire to be passive, in a sexual or romantic dynamic. Some people feel more comfortable in dominant or submissive relationship roles. But this is still an active, consensual decision, and that is the distinction. In my relationships with my family, I enjoy caring for and taking care of others, I enjoy cooking and don’t mind cleaning because it makes everyone’s life more livable. If a young sibling is ill I will nelgect my own desires, my own plans for the day, in order to ensure that they are comfortable and all right. I would be absolutely the same if I were in a romantic relationship, because this is my personality and it is what gives me pleasure. I do not do this simply because it’s expected of me (it’s not), but because it is the role I am most comfortable expressing. This submission to the needs and desires of other people is an expression of love. If this submission is forced, rather than an active expression of the person in question’s authentic personality and desires, as it often is, that relationship is abusive.

A real relationship allows for everyone involved to act however they like, to fill whatever role they like. Objectification does not. Objectification forces a role and a purpose onto the object which, even on theoretical occasion that this role and purpose might conicide with how that particular person expresses themselves, still limits that person’s ability to be anything outside of that narrow set of expectations. It is still wrong, and it is always wrong.

I posit that no, nobody ever really likes to be objectified. When people ask that question, or when people say that they like a little objectification now and then, I think it’s clear what they actually mean is that they enjoy being found attractive, they enjoy attention. These are perfectly valid wants and desires. But I am not willing to accept that anyone on Earth actually wants, of their own free will, to lose any and all freedom to define themselves or to have any real agency in their own lives. Powerlessness as a fantasy or a kink is not the same as actual powerlessness, as actual slavery and bondage. No one who actually cares about the subject would think to conflate the two while describing submission in those terms, and the fact is that being made into an object is very real powerlessness, is very real bondage to another person’s desires at the expense of one’s own.

Objectification is a forced loss of self.

No one has any right to ever, under any circumstances, inflict this on another person.

I was surfing the internet today and came across a statement to the effect of: “a woman wearing clothes that show cleavage or going without a bra is guaranteed to get male attention”. This was put forth as an advantage, a good thing, something to be desired. Context is not important here, because the fact of the matter is that I see this sexualized attitude towards breasts and bras all the time, and I can’t stand it.

Finding a woman’s breasts attractive is not, in and of itself, inherently a bad thing. It’s an aesthetic disposition that I happen to share. In general, they’ve got a pleasing shape, they’re kind of fun to manipulate, and they tend to be attached to people that I like. Thinking any particular body part is sexy isn’t really the issue here.

The issue is that I cannot choose to wear or not wear certain tops or undergarments, in order to be physically comfortable, without my choice somehow making other people feel entitled to comment, criticize, or stare. The idea is that by wearing clothes which partially reveal my breasts, or by choosing not to wear a bra even beneath “conservative” attire, or even by simply, by virtue of nature, having large mammaries (or, indeed, breasts at all), I have no right to complain if others make degrading or unwanted sexual advances. Somehow, by the mere virtue of being a female who happens to have a couple interestingly-shaped lumps of fat on my chest, I’ve given up all right to be treated with respect or dignity.

There’s really nothing one can do to avoid it. Even if I do all the “right” things, wearing horrible contraptions under my clothes that make me uncomfortable, totally covering anything that could be construed as suggestive or “inappropriate”, constantly hunching over to draw less attention to my chest (the real burden of having breasts — not the weight on your back, not the strain on your shoulders), because they are large, and noticeable, people will still sexualize them and feel entitled to harass me based on their very existence.

On the subject of cleavage? Dude, they’re big. A shirt which shows nothing on a smaller girl still ends up showing cleavage on someone with larger breasts. Unless I cover myself almost up to the neck, there’s going to be a little bit. I don’t have to wear anything with an excessively low neckline in order to achieve the effect; and I’m certainly not going to wear uncomfortably hot clothes in the summer, in 80 degree weather, or even, really, if I just don’t feel like wearing something that covers my entire body. I’m not going to try to hide them and pretend they’re not there and I’m not going to be ashamed that they exist.

On the subject of bras? I think they’re a joke. I find them uncomfortable and unbearable. I haven’t worn one in about three years. Whatever one finds most comfortable, I think, is really key. I have a hard time understanding why anyone would voluntarily wear one, but I don’t understand the appeal of smearing colorful goop one’s face or wearing shoes that are impossible to walk in that cause back pain, either. I kind of like having smooth skin but shaving’s not high on my list of priorities on account of the fact that it takes a lot of time and effort and I get ingrown hairs easily. This is my preference. I don’t really care what other people want to do to themselves. What I do care about is the social expectation, the cultural norm. The idea that I have to do these things which make me uncomfortable and cause me pain, otherwise I am “not taking care of myself” or I’m “asking” for unwanted attention — and that either way, whether I really live up to the standard or not, either way it is still an excuse that my actions make me deserving of harassment and mistreatment.

I think the real problem here is the sexualization of women’s breasts. As I said earlier, I don’t see anything really wrong with finding them sexy, but this is more of an incidental, decentralized kind of attraction, kind of like, “he has nice eyes” or “I think she has sexy elbows” or…whatever. What I mean by the term “sexualization” is the idea that breasts are inherently sexual objects (and therefore at once indecent and also the focus of sexual attention) when, really, breasts are not any more sexual than any other feature of the body. Breasts serve a very specific biological purpose: to feed babies.

Breasts do not exist to be stared at, and their very presence on a person’s body does not suddenly mean that their owner abdicates all right to respect or dignity. The fact that I have breasts is not an invitation for clearly unwanted sexual attention (mostly from straight men) or for verbal abuse (more or less from anyone). There are many issues at work here: the sense of entitlement to women’s bodies, especially on the part of many heterosexual men, but also in general; cultural conformity; the idea that women exist for the sexual pleasure and objectification of men, coupled with the idea that anything sexual is evil and bad. But I don’t have the time and energy to deconstruct all that just now. I’m too tired from even thinking about the vastness of it all.

This attitude about breasts is not really the problem. It’s a symptom of so much else that’s wrong with the world. But, in and of itself, it’s awful enough. In order to avoid this sort of attention, I should not have to try to cover all traces of their shape, their function. Is an organ developed to nurture children really indecent or obscene? What does that say about the priorities of my culture?

For now, some interesting links to pursue:

007b is a site with some good content, but probably NSFW (not that it really should be; it’s just pictures of breastfeeding mothers and the like). Among the highlights are a page on why women wear bras and whether or not there’s really any reason to aside from social pressure, and a gallery of pictures of normal, average breasts showing the variety of shapes and sizes they come in, to try to give the viewer a bit of a sense of perspective.

And then a link I remembered seeing linked at Alas a bit ago, which I think speaks for itself.

Finally, an old fem_rage post which perhaps describes my feelings about the matter more accurately but less articulately and with a lot more cursing.

Every activist has hir pet issues. Feminists, especially. Mine are gender and sexuality.

It’s not that I don’t care about abortion rights; I do. It’s not that I don’t care about the wage gap. It’s not that my range of concerns isn’t far-reaching and wide. It’s not that I don’t care about racism, or poverty, or war, because these are all things I feel very strongly about. It’s not that I’m not keeping track of the news and not as if I don’t talk about it with friends and family, but why post about it here when there are plenty of other blogs which already do so and so much better than I possibly could?

What I mostly find myself concerned with writing about are the politics of gender and sex and sexuality. The concepts and constructs. Thus, even though I am not trans (not exactly cisgendered, either — genderqueer? maybe) I find myself talking about trans issues all the time, as an example, or reading up on intersex conditions, etc. I’ve been trying to pinpoint exactly why this is. Why should I have such a profound interest in areas which have only very little to do with me?

I suppose it’s because I’m radical. Radical feminism is critical analysis, it’s seeing the whole picture, examining the entire framework, and finding the roots. Dismantling all the false assumptions on which the entire system thrives; because patterns of thought and behavior, especially those which are deeply embedded in the larger cultural psyche, are like weeds. Ideas are a living, growing, dynamic process. You can try to cut them down by hacking away at the growth, at the visible, conscious manifestations and their results and, in fact, this is necessary in order to allow a clear view of anything. However, until you take out the roots from which these ideas issue, the growth will always spring back, again and again. This is why feminist theory is just as important as feminist action and feminist organizing.

And all flawed systems, it seems, from sexism to racism to organized religion, any hierarchy you can imagine, depend on artificial constructions arising from the idea of duality. The construction of false dichotomies. The framework of diametrically opposed points, when, in fact, everything is a spectrum: male and female, masculine and feminine, good and evil, mental and physical, spiritual and material. It’s not that none of these things exist, it’s that they’re not a simple binary as so many people suppose.

So perhaps my pet causes aren’t always visible in the real world, not totally apparent to the untrained eye, perhaps too abstract and theoretical for everyone to readily grasp all the time — that doesn’t mean they’re not important. That doesn’t mean that they have nothing to do with me, or only a narrow application to certain small groups of people. Theoretical constructions affect everyone and have a huge impact on how we view the world. And so the basic assumptions which make a sexist social hierarchy possible to begin with — our current narrow concepts of sex and gender — need to be challenged. It’s only when these assumptions are dissected that the corrupt system issuing from them can be effectively dismantled.

There are very few things which I think are requirements for someone to be considered “feminist”. People can believe, for the most part, whatever the hell they want. I don’t have to agree with everything every other feminist says or does. They don’t have to agree with me. We don’t have to have the same ideas on politics, economics, class, education, literature, movies, clothing, cosmetics, shaving.

I won’t say, for example, that wearing high heels and makeup makes someone a “bad” feminist. Although you’re never going to convince me that, at this moment in time, a woman who chooses to adorn herself in this fashion is truly making a choice free of cultural influence and social conditioning — it’s still a personal decision and it’s not mine to make. Things like this, the small things, the trivial things, are still feminist issues, and they’re big ones because they’re so insidious and pervasive, but they pale in comparison to the truly horrific problems that women face in this world. I don’t care how you like to dress or what kind of sex you like to have; when we live in a world with rape, domestic violence, and female genital mutilation, I’ll take any ally who agrees on the basic concept of human rights. If the only issue we disagree on is lipstick or even BDSM, we have more in common than not.

I won’t even put stipulations on most of the bigger issues. I’m a big, huge, idealistic anarchocommunist — but I won’t say that anyone else has to be. I think there’s lots of room to work with on most issues. Different people have different opinions and experiences, and I’m glad for that diversity of thought. (On that note, the people who think that feminism is one cohesive delusional body which feeds its own beliefs through a loop of unquestioning positive feedback have obviously never actually seen a group of feminists trying — and failing — to have a rational discussion on a topic like, say, sex work.)

But there are a very few stipulations which I consider essential for someone to be a “good” feminist, and if these criteria are not met, well, that person can consider themselves a feminist all they want, but that doesn’t mean I’ll respect their opinions.
One the things I think is unacceptable in a “real” feminist is transphobia.

A feminist should never reject the experience or identity of a transwoman as being invalid, of being lesser than cisgendered women, of not being “real” — in general, or until she takes hormones, or until she undergoes SRS, or whatever predefined criteria said feminist happens to have. A feminist should never insist that transwomen are actually men and thus, that they have no place in feminism and no protection under it (or that transmen are women who are “betraying the cause” in order to “gain” male privilege, as the case may be). I understand that this attitude casts a number of prominent and influential feminist thinkers of the past and present as “bad” feminists, and that’s unfortunate but, I think, also necessary. Transphobia should never be tolerated from a self-proclaimed feminist.

Let me explain why. It’s not merely an issue of respect for marginalized people, and it’s not merely because those who hold this attitude are dismissing the perfectly valid experiences of different kinds of women (as mainstream feminism has famously done not only with transwomen, but also lesbians, poor women, women of color, and so on). These side-effects are horrible and inexcusable, but the real issue is that, at the root of transphobia are all the beliefs that feminism is supposed to be fighting.

The insistence that transwomen are not “real” women, is, at its heart, fueled by the idea that biology equals destiny: the idea that one’s body parts define that person completely, that there is no individual room for change or variation, that a woman is only as good as her ability to give birth (therefore, as good as her uterus), or to serve as a sex object (therefore, as good as her vagina, as good as her breasts), or as a caretaker, a mother, a housewife, a passive decoration (therefore, as good as her ability to conform to “acceptable” gender roles).

And that, no matter how you disguise it or dress it up, no matter what excuses you might give about male privilege or socialization or experience in a transwoman’s history, is not feminism.

This is why transphobia is so deeply harmful to feminism as a whole. It hurts not only the statistically small minority of transgendered people within the movement, but also anyone else who believes in the idea that a woman is more than her vagina, more than her womb, more than her own victimization and oppression. Transphobia reduces everyone to a collection of parts, to be examined and scrutinized in order to see if they stand up to the test of being “good” or “real” enough — to see if they “deserve” rights and recognition.

Anyone can call themselves a feminist. Anyone can say they are whatever they want to say they are. But if they espouse ideals and opinions which run directly contrary to the ideology they claim to support and represent, they are no ally of mine.

Dealing With Straight People:

If I fit a stereotype too well, straight people will tell me I’m being “too” queer. Similarly, if I bring up queer issues or rights or challenge heteronormative assumptions, I am, again, being “too” queer. The implication here is that I somehow need to try to assimilate into straight culture and be more straight. This is often not because there is anything wrong with being queer, but simply because bringing up these issues or being myself (if myself happens to fit a particular stereotype) makes others uncomfortable because it is different. Therefore, I need to alter my behavior, interests, appearance, and/or activism in order to make the dominant party more comfortable so that they either a) don’t have to treat me like a human being or b) don’t have to bear the fight for queer rights on their conscience.

If I love myself for who I am and am not apologetic, if I love who I love for who they are and still don’t feel the need to apologize, and if I feel like talking about it openly or contributing to a conversation among straight people concerning everyone’s partners, I am “flaunting my sexuality”. They are allowed to talk about their opposite-sex partners at length, but if I talk about a girlfriend, even in a non-explicit manner perfectly appropriate for casual conversation, I am giving them “too much information” which some of them will inform me they “really don’t want to hear”. I don’t mind hearing about your opposite-sex attractions, and I’m generally more reserved about my own personal preferences, tastes, and partners than most people are about theirs, so I don’t really understand why this is so horrible for me to mention that, yes, I happen to like girls, in passing.

(And, truthfully, here I exaggerate. Many queer people I know have complained about being treated this way, but, thankfully, all the straight people I associate with don’t suck. At least not in this way. I try not to be friends with people who show me no respect — it took far too long for this to occur to me, however.)

Also: bisexuals don’t exist. I’m not “really” queer. Bi men are simply homosexual and in the closet and it’s only a matter of time before they come out. I, as a woman who is not strictly homo or hetero, am apparently attracted to women solely so that I can get the attention of men. One day, it is assumed I will find the right man and settle down with him and pop out straight babies; if I actually do find a man I would want to spend my life with, the people who think this will assume that they were correct to begin with, but they are not, though there will be nothing I can do to convince them otherwise.

Dealing With Queer People:

If I don’t fit a stereotype, queer people will tell me I’m not queer “enough”. I will hear queer friends talk about the stereotypes that all queer people are supposed to fit, even when I am in the room and I clearly don’t fit them, and the person in question doing the stereotyping does not, either. (Unfortunately, this generalization is far more based in my own reality and experience than most of the dealing with straight people ones.)

Not only by being a femme queer woman does the queer community itself exclude and marginalize me as a member, giving off the illusion that we don’t exist, that we’re faking, that we aren’t good enough, but since I am not strictly a lesbian I am, again, assumed to be fictional, and for the same reasons that straight people assume that I am lying or do not exist.

If I do not enjoy participating in pride events because of my claustrophobia in large crowds and distaste for the atmosphere, I not being a “good” queer. If I don’t enjoy being part of a group of people with whom I have nothing in common other than my queerness (despite personality conflicts, no common interests, or facing totally opposing viewpoints), I’m not a good queer. If I do not enjoy wearing rainbow paraphernalia I am not being a good queer either.

Dealing With Everyone:

If I, as a pansexual woman, decide to date a man, people (regardless of their own orientation) will assume that I am now straight, as if by acting on one aspect of my attraction I have somehow forgotten about the rest. I saw a good post on this subject on the LJ queer_rage community, challenging the assumption by some homosexuals that bi/pan people benefit from an implicit privilege in our heteronormative society. Yes, if I date a man I will benefit from people’s misplaced assumption that I am straight, and perhaps will be free from some of the more blatant homophobia which might confront me if my date were a woman (which is unfair and truly unfortunate), but is being assumed to be something that you are not really a privilege? Is a huge portion of your person being ignored or treated as if it does not exist really a benefit? Does my existence being made invisible mean that I really have the privilege of appearing straight when I am not? I suppose the same “assumed straight” privilege can be extended to queers in the closet, but does anyone truly believe that’s a comfortable place to be?

(Mind you, I understand the resentment from the queer side of the argument, but that doesn’t mean I have to agree with it. Being treated as straight when I’m not is just as hurtful to me as it is to any other queer, whether it means prejudiced people are less likely to give me a hard time or not. It’s simply expressed in different and often more subtle, extremely damaging ways.)

Heteronormitivity is everyone’s enemy.

Also: I can’t stand people who feel the need to know my orientation. Are you gay or straight? Are you a lesbian? Are you bi? But I thought you were — but you look — but you act — but you said…

Look, if I’m attracted to you in a remotely meaningful way, you’ll know. I’ll tell you or flirt with you or make it obvious in some other way. (Or, the more likely and more common scenario — I will definitely let you know if I’m not interested in you, just so there is no confusion. If you really need to know if I feel that way about you or some other particular person…ask?) If I’m not? Can’t see why it should matter to you. Do you really need to put me in a box? If we’re not romantically or sexually involved, is it relevant? Are you so insecure that you must always know exactly what label everyone fits so that you feel in control? So that you don’t feel confused? I’m perfectly allowed to be ambiguous about it if my sexuality has nothing to do with my relationship to you. If you are my friend or someone I really care about, I may try to explain myself to you. Or I may not. If it’s not your sex life, why do you actually care?

Dealing With Me:

I like the word “queer” as a descriptor. I pride myself on the original definition of the word, the perceived insult of not being normal, not being like everyone else. Of course, if a homophobe uses it as an insult I will still be offended, not because of the choice of word — anything can be hurtful if the person behind it thinks it is something that should be.

“Queer” is an open-ended word, inclusive of the entire GLBTQXYZ umbrella. It can mean just about anything that is not the default assumption. I can be anything if I’m queer, so long as I’m me. I don’t have to be a lesbian, I don’t have to be bi, I don’t have to define myself in any stricter terms because I am me.

That’s all I want to be.